Bristolian Life - Day 2

Quick recap on last night. Went with Jake and Guy across the street to King William to play pool. English pool tables are a bit smaller than in the US, and the balls are too and they are just two colors, no numbers at all. So we couldn’t play cutthroat. I played like shyte, but I reckon the several pints of beer in me was throwing off my A-game. After a few games we then headed down the street to a cider house called Apple. Never had cider before and it was fairly good, a bit fruity. The pint was huge and this thing is like a 9% alcoholic beverage. After that we headed out to a place called SoHo. Kind of a club, bar and here I just had water. Was getting really tired and told the guys that I needed to go home. Plus it was late and I didn’t really feel like getting locked out of the pub my first night.

They walked me back to Sublime where I headed straight upstairs and into bed. Wednesday morning woke up pretty early so I could get a start on opening a bank account and look for a mobile. I took a bath, got dressed, and headed downstairs. As soon as I walked out from the back and into the bar area I hear “BeepBeepBeepBeep!!!!!” Damn this place has an alarm and I set it off. I just stood there not knowing what to do, then I could hear Nick upstairs turning the alarm off. He said he forgot to tell me about the alarm and would show me how to turn it off. Then he let me out and I went to Barclays and opened my current account (that’s what they call a checking account here), then walked around the City Center looking for a mobile. I found a T-Mobile store and the guy in there was really nice and helpful. I had a lot of questions especially about International calls and service coverage Internationally. Then I looked at Vodafon and after sitting and reviewing the two I decided T-Mobile was the best for the money. BUT, when I went back to sign up they asked if I had a UK debit card. I won’t get it until early next week so I have to wait until then. Rats. Actually it’s good, forces me to take my time and look at other places. Picked up a brochure from O2 (looks crapy), and then I was told 3 is a really good place and so far they have the best International plan. We shall see.

So after all that I came back to the pub and JD was there and I made a comment about going around the corner to the post office to pick up my parcel that they tried to deliver a few days prior. He laughed and said it wasn’t at the post office, but somewhere else far away and that he would drive me there. We headed out and I got to see the outskirts of Bristol, it is a very pretty area. JD and I were chatting away and he was cracking me up I haven’t laughed like that since we had our “Cousin’s Dinner” before I left home. Must be an Irish thing that we crack each other up. So we are driving for a while and kind of get lost which makes us laugh even more. I mean really this BusinessPost place left a card at the pub with a little map on it basically showing 2 main roads intersecting and below that a rectangle labeled as “This is us”. We were driving up and down the roads forever, and JD even stopped at a few other businesses to ask where Business Post was, but no one seemed to know. Long story short, we eventually found it, got my parcel, and headed back to the pub.

Back at the pub I attempted to get online with the work laptop but it still wasn’t working, which worried me since I was starting work the next day. Nick went upstairs to check on the wireless port and found that it was knocked over, so he fixed it and in an instant I was online. Yay! Access to email and Internet. Stayed up pretty late checking emails and such, finally got to bed around midnight- good thing I don’t actually have to go far to get to work tomorrow, heehee.